Tag: South Africa

Lark + Taxi Violence + Plastics = BEAST

Review: BEAST, SMOKE SWIG SWEAR (2013)

The photos I took of the SMOKE SWIG SWEAR album launch at Assembly are too shameful so instead here is a picture of the bear head guy who was standing in front of me.
The photos I took of the SMOKE SWIG SWEAR album launch at Assembly are too shamefully bad so instead here is a picture of the bear head guy who was standing in front of me.

BEAST is South Africa’s supergroup. They’re our The Traveling Wilburys or The Raconteurs, and they’re just as super. I’ve been wanting to do this review since about 10 minutes after I first heard their album when it was released a few month ago – it’s really, really good.

So, charisma abounds with Inge Beckmann (Lark), Louis Nel and Rian Zietsman (Taxi Violence) and Sasha Righini (The Plastics) on drums. The Taxi Violence guys both play bass, so there’s no ‘regular’ guitar, which for most of us just means we want to describe the music as ‘dark’, but we’re not sure why. Continue reading “Lark + Taxi Violence + Plastics = BEAST”

Failed flashmobs, gumballs and a Visit from the Goon Squad

Here’s how today’s #GumballSA debacle reminds me of an excellent novel I just read.

Today a scandal broke on Twitter. Again. This time, videos were circulated of people doing odd things at Cresta Shopping Centre in Johannesburg. At first people thought these were failed and embarrassing flash mobs. Then, a couple of hours later, some other people started tweeting links to their blogs with the hashtag #GumballSA … and the ugly truth was revealed.

Continue reading “Failed flashmobs, gumballs and a Visit from the Goon Squad”

The top 20 SA magazines on Twitter

I was working this list out again, to check how Kick Off was doing, and decided to publish the results here, in case anybody is interested.

Continue reading “The top 20 SA magazines on Twitter”

Krap on the trains

Taking the train every day you see a lot of interesting things. Some of the graffiti is most interesting indeed. I spend a lot of time looking at it, smirking, and taking surreptitious photos, leading a lot of people to believe I am a creep. Who cares? I’m not the only one. Graffiti comes from the Italian word graffiato, which means ‘scratched’. The Afrikaans word for scratch is ‘krap’. The English word for what a lot of this graffiti is, is ‘crap’. It’s all nicely summed up in my first picture.

‘Julle ma se poeste. Waarvoor krap julle so op die f…ken trein, nou maak julle my ook krap. [indecipherable signature] STOP IT.’

Continue reading “Krap on the trains”

Top South African magazines on Twitter

MediaSlut used to compile this list, but hasn’t done one recently, and since I was gasping to find out where Kick Off is in the top 20 these days, I decided to pull it together myself. Continue reading “Top South African magazines on Twitter”